When is a salad not a salad?

This is a confusing question. It may help to begin at the beginning.According to foodtimeline.org salads are generally described as mixed greens with dressing.

Toby Hatchett

This is a confusing question. It may help to begin at the beginning.

According to foodtimeline.org salads are generally described as mixed greens with dressing. The early Romans and Greeks ate salad. Time marched on. Salads became more complex, or hated.

Almost exactly 300 years ago, according to ChefTalk.com, Englanders could buy the first book ever written on how to make a salad. Called "Acetaria: A Discourse of Sallets" (aceteria being an old word for salads). Well, Englanders didn't really want to eat raw lettuce. It was the mark of a civilized person living in those times to eat meat and potatoes, not raw greens. These were considered the food for animals and those not cultured.

That was a long time ago. Now, salads seem to be a mark of a sophisticated taste. Or, a taste of someone who cares for his or her body and how it is fueled. It is politically correct to order a salad and have the dressing on the side. Only clear dressings, please. No creamy stuff that tastes really good.

Those in the salad-know look askance at those at a salad bar piling their plates with everything extra on top of a few lettuce leaves, then smothering it in the gooiest of dressing. Well, it does taste good sometimes. Is eating a healthy salad an acquired taste? A pretend taste? Just how self-righteous does it feel to order a truly monkish salad when dining out while others enjoy a salad with all the fixings?

Melissa Snow, a dietitian/nutritionist practicing in Portsmouth, has some very definite ideas about salad.

Snow says one can be really creative with salad. Cucumbers are good for crunch and can be cut up in so many ways, she said. What she calls the "extras" are nuts, seeds, dried fruits, feta cheese. They add a nice subtle flavor, she says.

"I do instruct my patients to use a good olive oil vinaigrette. Bacon is really not good for you. It's a fat and has nitrates that are carcinicous. Eggs, on the other hand, are perfect in salads. A hard-boiled egg only has 70 calories," said Snow.

She said it is the total saturated fat that adds calories and raises cholesterol. Snow stressed that variety is key with salads. This is what keeps people coming back.

"The darker greens have more vitamin activity," Snow said. "If you like iceberg lettuce, good, just mix it with other greens and vegetables.

"A salad with fried chicken on it, no, this is not what I would call a healthy or good salad," Snow said.

Snow could fit right in with Hippocrates. While the ancient Greeks and Romans didn't use the word "salad," they ate salad. They used a variety of ingredients, dressed with vinegar, oil and herbs. Hippocrates believed that raw vegetables easily slipped though the system and did not create obstructions for what followed. They believed salads should be served first.

Others thought the opposite.

The vinegar in the salad dressing wreaked havoc with the taste of the wine. Ergo, the salad should be served at the end of the meal. This debate continues today.

The term salade is derived from the Vulgar Roman herba salata, which means, literally, salted herb. This information comes from the book "Sallets," by Dr. Alice Ross.

At the very end of the 19th century in the United States, domestic science was in its heyday of control. Mixed greens on a plate were considered messy! Thus, orderly presentations and molded gelatin salads (read: Jell-O) came into being.

It has taken us a long time to recover, but who doesn't sometimes wonder what it might be like to eat lime Jell-O with crushed pineapple in it as a salad and consider it healthy?

Wonders in the salad world continue. Back in the '40s, '50s and early '60s, sweet salads with Jell-O and even whipped cream were considered OK (salad bars were "invented" in the 1960s).

Not so today. Today, less is supposed to be better. By less, a few dark leaves, perhaps one tiny tomato and a chick pea or two with lemon juice and a scant sprinkling of the finest olive oil. Well, perhaps this is the extreme, but anyone who has dined out in fine restaurants knows this phenomenon.

It is still popular in chain and franchise restaurants to offer up a salad served inside a fried tortilla shell, with bacon, melted cheese and the kitchen sink thrown in.

Yet, when is a salad not a salad is probably a question that cannot be answered. Given the history of salads, just about anything goes. With more space, one could delve into potato salad, chicken salad, tuna salad and fruit salad. This topic is not easily contained. Just like any good salad.

A healthy and nutritious salad can taste great. It does taste great. America's taste buds are evolving just as fast as the number of ingredients now available.

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